Turbine engines, and particularly gas or combustion turbine engines, are rotary engines that compress inlet air through a series of compressor stages, which include pairs of rotating blades and stationary vanes, into a combustor in which fuel is added and burned, and then onto a multitude of turbine blades and vanes. In the compressor stages, blades extend into the flowpath from the rotor while the vanes are mounted to stator. Gas turbine engines have been used for land and nautical locomotion and power generation, but are most commonly used for aeronautical applications such as for airplanes, including helicopters. In airplanes as well as helicopters, gas turbine engines are used for propulsion of the vehicle.
The combustor of a gas turbine engine typically has an igniter for igniting fuel in the combustor, and often has one or more borescope ports, which allow service technicians to view internals of the gas turbine engines. The igniter assembly typically includes a series of stacked components for aligning the igniter within the combustor and allowing for thermal growth differences between the outer case and the hot side flowpath. Further, each borescope port may include a series of stacked components, which are closed by a borescope plug. Borescope plugs occur in all regions of the gas turbine engine. They may need to be cooled in the compressor aft stages, the combustor as well as the turbines. Due to the high operation temperatures, cooling holes are typically provided in the components for the igniter and borescope ports to attempt to prevent excessive temperatures and damage to these components. Current attempts to cool the igniter and bore scope ports do not provide adequate cooling to the portion of the igniter, bore scope port, and its corresponding mount, at areas directly adjacent to the hot side flowpath inside the gas turbine engine, which can have temperatures in excess of 3,000° F.